February 14, 2013

last man standing

Prince Muqrin is the youngest surviving son of the late Ibn Saud (a.k.a. King Abdulaziz), the founder of Saudi Arabia. He is now the third most powerful person in the kingdom, behind King Abdullah (who also serves as prime minister) and Crown Prince Salman (the deputy prime minister). Both of these men are ailing, however: Abdullah (age 90) is rarely seen standing upright and has a limited attention span, and Salman (77) has dementia. In comparison, Muqrin (70) appears to be in good health.

Thing is, you get lots of commentary about how structural factors mean that China has to change, but I've never seen any such learned analysis of the House of Sordid, despite its obvious decrepitude.

Whenevr I talk to oil industry people about the political environments in which they work, it is clear that they see Saudi Arabia as the model. For them, the problem with Nigeria is that it is so different from Saudi Arabia.